Francisco Marco del Pont

Francisco Marco del Pont (25 June 1770-19 May 1819) was the Captain-General of Chile from 1815 to 1817 under New Spain's rule.

Biography
Del Pont was born in Vigo in Galicia and acheived the rank of General in the Spanish Army during the Peninsular War, and he was captured in the 1809 siege of Valencia. He was sentenced to death with the possibility of pardon if he swore allegiance to France, and when he refused, an impressed Jose I of Spain commuted him to life imprisonment instead. In 1814 he was freed after the French retreated, and at the young age of 45, he was made a Field Marshal of Spain and Governor of Tortosa. In September 1815 he became the Captain-General of Chile.

Del Pont believed that brutality would keep the Chileans in line, and many suffered depradations at the hands of the Spanish. On 12 February 1817, however, the Chilean Rebels took the capital after winning the Battle of Chacabuco and he was captured at the Las Tablas hacienda near El Quisco, Chile. He died in the city of Lujan in Argentina as a prisoner of Jose de San Martin.